George Eliot

This mini-series is intended to introduce George Eliot to undergraduates. The first lecture ranges widely across her works, including her atypical novella ‘The Lifted Veil’. It notes the power and range of Eliot’s intellect, and her changing attitudes to the proper function and remit of the intellect and consciousness. The second lecture considers how narrative justice operates in relation to the genres of comedy and tragedy, in works including ‘Adam Bede’ and ‘Daniel Deronda’. The third lecture encourages its audience to see itself as part of the latest stage in Eliot’s British reception history, which is traced from her lifetime onwards with particular concentration on the trough her reputation suffered in the first three decades of the twentieth century. This final lecture is accompanied by a Powerpoint presentation.